As per the title really, my girlfriend and I have decided to take the plunge, after four years together.

Neither of us has a great urge to spend thousands on a huge wedding, and you never know what little expenses are round the corner. Working on that basis we are looking for something a bit smaller, with family and close friends (max 35), but we would like it to be a memorable day.

I remember a thread about a similar thing, but the search is letting me down, so have any of you guys done this sort of thing and if so what made the day special for you?

[defensive mode]For me it would be more than special enough just to get married and spend the rest of my life with my girlfriend[/defensive mode]

Thanks
Matt

We did. We simply had no money at all at the time. It was a traditional wedding, church, reception, evening do, honeymoon but we were just really careful about everything. Went for the cheapest option we could on everything. When I went out to buy the rings I had 40 quid to spend, so we both have these very thin, cheap white gold bands from Ratnors or something.

Specifically, we saved proper money on the evening do (family got together and made loads of snacks and butties), hired a very cheap hall in Birkenhead. When we phoned up one of the car hire companies, the woman on the phone kept complaining about how these new computers they had never worked so we eventually managed to get the cars for free on the condition that I went round there and sorted out all their computers. 😉

The honeymoon was in the Lakes, hired a cottage near Keswick.

The place where I;d say never try to save, is the photographer. Any dickhead can take good pictures when everything goes right but if things start going wrong, weather/people/timings, that's when a true professional shows their worth. And ours was very fast, which when it's 30 degrees and people are all stoof around waiting, is a good thing.

We had a marquee in the garden with caterers. All in cost was about £2000. It was 20 years ago though, but I wouldn't do it any differently today.

Wife and I had a rather memorable and low cost wedding.

Stretch limo picked us up from the hotel and took us to our wedding hall. The event was captured on video, webcam (broadcast live), and rather nice photo's were taken. After Elvis had performed the ceremony we had a reception in a hall at the back of the building with pink champagne and a nice cake, before the limo came and picked us up again to return us to our hotel.

We were treated like royalty throughout, as were the eight or nine close friends and family that were invited. In fact, we enjoyed it so much, we're going back to do it again in a couple of years when we hit our tenth anniversary.

http://www.vivalasvegasweddings.com/renewalofvows.htm

As I recall, the all in cost was $420 (not counting getting there), and we've managed to stick to our vows of , "Being each other's Teddy Bears" and "Never, ever, ever, have a Blue Sunday" 😆

Beagy 8)

£4000 for us, hired a restaurant boat in the Bristol Harbour, had about 20 guests, had the wedding at 5pm on the boat then dinner at 7pm, nice and straightforward and was a lovely evening.

This is us in the picture..

The restaurant even used one of our pictures for their website.

We did by luck.
I grew up near a Royal Doulton factory and they supplied China, tables chairs glasses etc all because my mum called the fire brigade when their place was about to go up one weekend.
A local car hire company supplied the Rollers.
My old regiment sorted the reception and made sure the Church pushed the boat out.
My father in laws a master baker and sorted the Catering.
My mum somehow blagged the booze, years of running pubs I guess. So the bar was free (that's a family tradition) couple of Army blokes ran the bar and were paid in left ofver booze.
It cost us virtually nothing. I think because everyone in my familly is trade it doesn't cost.
Like now, I did some electrical work for someone and they're doing some carpentry for me, and another guys doing my drive but won't want paying.

My mate had his wedding in Carbisdale castle youth hostel in the highlands, with everyone staying there at a grand cost of £20 each per night. Was in November so had sole use of the place. Grandest youth hostel in Europe and wedding ceilidh was in the main hall, with stags heads and all! Was amazing and felt like the grandest wedding Id ever been to. And all for buttons really. He had a lot of mates from the area who helped with catering and bagpipes, photography etc which helped.

we had a fairly low key wedding. family lunch and party in the eve with friends. honeymoon in our campervan in scotland. photos by a family friend. family lunch ended up quite big as the missus has a huge extended irish family.

still added up but it was alot cheaper than most we have been to.

Ah I remember Virgin did the music, as in Branson Virgin. Shows how long ago it was.
Near on two hundred guests to justify what people had given.

@samuri, our photographer got it wrong, there were a lot of trees in the church grounds and he used flash so it looked like they were all taken at night, except the longer/wider shots.

When I went out to buy the rings I had 40 quid to spend, so we both have these very thin, cheap white gold bands from Ratnors or something.

My wedding ring was about £20 in Argos, as was my wife's engagement ring. She's replaced her, equally cheap, wedding ring 4 times in the last year or so at a grand total cost of about £15 – a £1.50 mood ring, and £8 ring from Portobello Road market and now a £6 ring she saw in a gift shop somewhere.

We had some family, some food and a room – that's all we needed as far as I was concerned, but the wife added some flowers and a nice dress 🙂 Cost about US$3000 if I remember correctly. We did it off-season so things were cheaper, the hotel gave us a great deal on accommodation because they were basically empty. We did get a photographer as a favour from someone but they didn't turn up, so my best man who happened to have his nice camera took a few – plenty good enough for me.

Oh, and for rings, the one my wife liked for engagement was a £90 semi-precious one, my wedding ring was £90 titanium.. her cheap white gold band though did get scruffy so later we splashed for a £400 platinum one.

you mad spendthrifts 😛

I was on a bare living wage (my take home was less than the dole), registry office wedding, drove there in our Bedford CF van. carvery reception for the mums and dads. cake made by M-I-L. local pub opened specially for our drunken noisy friends 🙂 (Turf Hotel , shuts for the winter, opened for us exclusively).

total cost in money **** all – certainly well under a grand.
surrounded by friends and family, lovely sunny day for all, priceless.

Instead of cheap gold ring, have a look at Ti. Company called GH Moore in Birmingham stock them ~£60.
Go for a Friday rather than Saturday

I can say without doubt, even if it might sound like a generalisation. The worst weddings I've been to have been the most lavish.

Dress: we bought an ex-hire. Oxfam now have a good range of used dresses.
Car: Walk.
Guests: less is more.

We originally planned a big hoohar, but couldn't justify spending thousands on one day when the money would be better spent elsewhere – new boiler/car/carpets/bathroom/kitchen/nursary etc.

Seeing as we were skint (still are) and the future Mrs was 7 months gone, we had a fast cheap do.
£60 for the registry office wedding, £30 for the wedding dress, £20 for flowers. Asked a local Resturant to open at Saturday Lunch time (gave them rough numbers) and then told everyone when and where. Explained we were going to the resturant for lunch and if they wanted to join us it was every man for himself.
£80 for a room in a hotel in York for the night, that was the honeymoon.

After we'd left for York everyone else went to my sister's house and partied all night.

9 years on, i'd still do it the same way, afterall it's still me she's marrying and no amount of money spent on the wedding is going to fix that 🙂

Do you own thing – you'll have the day of your life.

Wifey and I headed to the registry office in a taxi and walked to a pub for lunch. The bulk of the budget was blown on a ceilidh band for the evening's entertainment – you have to spend money where it matters.

Do what you are happy with, real friends always love to help out.

Got married 3 weeks after proposing – helped that my dad was local priest, so free church, big vicarage garden for the reception etc, asked guests to bring champagne instead of gifts & family all helped out with the catering & everyone had a blinding day.

Just to echo some of the points above – I've been to quite a few weddings and the cost/size has had no connection to how good the wedding was. So long as the bride and groom are happy with it WGAF about what anyone else (incl close family…) think.

FWIW, my wedding was reasonably big (115 people) but not hugely expensive (in the grand scheme of things) – approx £8k plus the honeymoon cost – about £3k

The best smaller weddings I've been to have been in a nice setting with the things that matter done right (eg a good atmosphere, acceptable food and good booze 🙂 ) and a bunch of people who are there to enjoy themselves rather than try any competitive-wedding type stuff.

imn, we got our rings there. The engagement ring and both wedding rings. For a little more, they'll do it in Ti-6Al-4V (Grade 5) rather than the normal Ti.

Ours costs about £2k and £800 of that was my wifes wedding dress! We had a church wedding followed by a reception in a local gastro pub, where we requested guests to pay for their own meal. I bought drinks for everyone for the toasts and we just give the pub an iPod with a playlist set up for the music through the PA. We combined the wedding with our daughters christening and couldn't have afforded it without guests paying their way. No one was offended and looking back I wouldn't change the way we did things.

Me and Mrs.TRH got married in Vegas then came back and had a party at the local. Door-2-door including spending money,wedding,rings, pub hire and week in NY cost about £3k

friends did

registry office, I did music (ghetto blaster, supplied cd, and groom cues), casual or oxfam dress

reception was a hired public hall and an india takeaway delivery (paper plates etc cutlery supplied by b+g)
music (apart from first dance etc stuff) was supplied and played and played by guests on ghetto blaster
all guests helped putting up/down tables cahirs etc etc, rubbish collecting etc and brought their own booze etc

a great time was had by all

for ours the most expensive thing was the Church (since my dads the sides man there, and my mum was in the choir it'd been rude not to go there)
Missus's dress was made to measure at a local design studio – cost £150, got my suit from there too.

recpetion was a garden party the missus' parents backgarden. we home brewed the wine and beer. the local wine and beer circle which her folks were members of provided the glasses and marquee/gazeebo.

we got married in Whistler. The holiday was expensive but the wedding was really cheap. About $100 for the commissioner, about the same again for the licence, then just her dress. You can get married outside in Canada so we didn't veen have to bother paying for a venue.

we had a great day, weather helped it was redders! local church to local village hall. her mum did the food, my mum made her dress and we went to bournmouth for 4 days honeymoon. was an awsome day and came in at well under a grand! mind you that was 26 years ago but no reason all the same is not possible today.

I have not been married, but have been to a wedding of very close friends who had pretty much more budget at all for their wedding. My friend getting married made her own dress, and also made a shirt and some trousers for the groom. The reception was in their cottage, and everyone brought a dish for the meal, as there was no budget for food really (their financial circumstances were very problematic). But yeah, a great wedding, we had sunny weather, and the focus was just on the great love between two very good friends of mine.

Ours probably ended up costing just over £1000, most of which paid for by my wife's dad.

Simple and low key. Registry office in a nice location, everyone back at ours for food and beer. Food prepared by us and our friends, marquees borrowed from another friend, booze from the local brewery, cider place from back home and wine from wherever we could find organic wine.

We had enough for two parties too.

Wedding dress from Ebay, as was my suit. Rings were new and custom made from a girl off http://www.folksy.com

🙂

If your not too bothered about what time of year you get married, try for early in the year. Place we got married did an offer for Jan and Feb. Cut a couple of grand of the price for wedding, meal, drinks and evening bun fight.

As for the dress, friend of our bought one of those made to measure ones from China on Ebay. £5 dress, £75 postage. Just measure her up, send them off and a couple of weeks later the dress came and was spot on. Perfect, very well made and up to date design (so mrs skip says)

Best of luck with it all (and agree that the most expensive ones are also the most tacky!!!)

Wifey's mum mae her dress. The reception was the most expensive part at about £2k for a pleasure boat cruise out of Southampton to the Isle of Wight and back with catering for 50.
Honeymoon was a Sun £10 holiday in a caravan park outside Newquay.
It took a few years of making up before she stopped suggesting that maybe I shouldn't have gone skiing with my mates earlier in the year………..

We got married in the ice hotel in Lapland, just the two of us with no family. I'm family phobic and our two repective familes are like oil and water mine's so Southern and repressed I don't think I seen my Dad without a tie on till I was ten and hers are typical brassy Nortehrn Blackpool.

At the time I was working as a £7p/h office temp and my wife was earning £18K (which we thought was a fortune) and we paid foreverything ourselves without anyone's help.

Wife's dress came from ebay (£5 for a red velvet evening dress from Vietnam) with a cloak from a fantasy clothing maker.
Mine was an old Napoloenic theatrical millitary costume.

We spent a bit on traveling around before and after, but the actual cost of the wedding plus flights came in at under two grand inculding a night actually sleeping in the ICE part of the Ice hotel before moving to a cabin. I'm a total tightwad so I still complained at that cost but it was good.

We got married in a registry office too, £35 back then.

She bought a dress £400, two rings for £40 and family & friends back at the family home for food and something to drink.

No wedding photographer (I used to be a photographer back then) so we had a few Pro's taking casual photographs on the day, formal wedding photographs are not for us 😉

Cake & food made by friends & family.

Looking back at all the weddings we have been to in the past, the best have always been, as above, simple and low key.

Ours was sub 500quid. Wife made her own dress, I bought a shirt I really wanted (so could use in the future), we self catered/decorated etc. Biggest expense was the childerens entertainer (100quid or so) who did magic amd a puppet show and as it was xmas eve my dad dressed up as father christmas and appeared with gifts for the little ones.

Best mate got married couple of years ago.. great day:

married in manchester reg office – wedding pictures around iconic manchester places and buildings (pics by his work colleague), then a champagne (Cava) picnic in a nice park mid morning followed by lunch at a local restaurant, then free time, then they hired the top of a proper boozer in the city centre with snacks laid on and buy your own drinks.. music on a home done mega mix

great day – though would of been less good is the weather had not played ball due…

Just thought of something else…. worth checking if any parents/grand parents have any old family wedding rings. My wifes gran had some that had belonged to her parents and we had them re-made by a local jewelery artist for about 100quid. The rings are made from gold that the old boy had found himself in the states as he spent some time prospecting. They mean so much more to us because of that connection than anything we could have bought no matter what the cost.

Ok, here's my rough breakdown…

We hired the local Liberal club, it was a bit scummy, but TBH with the lights down it looked like anywhere else. That was free to hire, but we gave them £50 for cleaning up for us. Paid £200 on balloons, streamers, glitter stuff and table cloths to make it look nice (and it did). Ceilidh band cost £300 and played a three hour set. DJ was an Ipod through the bands PA for before/after the band/ first dance etc. Venue had their own basic disco lights (ball, three colour flashers etc)

Food from local curry restaurant, £500. More food than our 300 guests could eat, delicious and they provided all their own staff to bring food and take it away again. Only cost so much as it was Eid, and all the staff were on triple time.

Plate and Glass hire cost about £200 all in.

My dad bought loads of cheap champaign from Marks and Spencer (join a wine club/ check offers with credit cards etc) can't remember how many bottles but there was plenty left over and that lot cost about £300.

Put £250 behind the bar so ushers/ best man were able to "buy" people drinks. Mother in law paid for fancy Bently from church to venue so don't know how much that cost. other bits and pieces soon add up, probably about £2500 all in.

booked wedding night hotel last minute (£250 room reduced to £80) dad paid for honeymoon to Maldives, but anywhere can be nice depending on what you two like.

Good luck and don't forget, wedding mgazines will lie to you to make you spend money and you don't HAVE to spend thousands. People will tell you "if you don't spend at least X ammount on this, the whole day will be ruined." they are lying.

At the end of the day, its about you, your fiance, your friends and families getting boozed up, having a dance and celebrating the begining of your life together as a married couple. Flowers/balloons/fancy cars/silver service/ expensive champaign do not make or break the day.

We chose a crap venue as it held lots of people, had a stage and sold cheap beer. It was also close to the church and not in the middle f no where so people could get taxis home or stay in a range of hotels.

22 years, not married yet…Cost: nothing.

One of the best weddings I went to was extraordinarily expensive.

Most of the weddings I went to I didn't speak to the bride or groom, even my brothers, whats the point. So I thought sod spending 10K on a party and buying 40 people a roast dinner and I went to the registy office with 2 close friends and then spend a fair wedge on a nice meal for the 4 of us and a load of expensive booze.

Probably spend under £200 including the ceremony and licence, plus my wifes ring was a good few 00

I think if we spent more than £300 I'd be surprised. We had 8 of us, including me and my wife. Well 8 and a half actually. And it wasn't exactly a massive planning challenge. Registry office, then we all went
to a pub in Kirby Lonsdale.

My brother was late, he rang in and was being guided in to the registry office by passers by. We were huddled round a mobile phone with the registrar listening to his progress cos he'd accidentally left his phone switched on. "scuse me mate, which way to the registry office?" [pitter patter, running sound etc etc]. We cheered him on, he wasn't aware…

There was heckling/banter throughout. High point was when the registrar said "you know what to do now". I think in retrospect he expected me to kiss the bride. I actually took my trousers down at this point.

When I see the hassle/stress people go through for a posh bash, I'd rather our approach, but having said that a trip to somewhere like the ice palace would've been good, and I've been to a few good weddings which were expensive too.

Yeah I know, they should make a chick flick about it right?

I never paid a penny, her in-laws sorted that all out 😉